Jamestown: The Starving TimeThis lesson provides a great opportunity for students to engage in real historical inquiry with prepared sources. The lesson is displayed in three locations on the site: the student view, which guides the student through the activity; the teacher view, which provides additional background information; and a PDF file that contains scripted instructions for the lesson.

Midnight Ride of Paul Revere: Fact, Fiction, and Artistic LicenseThis lesson asks students to use primary source evidence to assess Grant Wood’s famous 1931 painting, The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere. Students must also determine the event's historical significance. This lesson offers a wealth of resources for analyzing artwork as historical evidence and provides a nice example for using artwork along with written documents to learn about the past.

Revolutionary War

The Boston Massacre: Fact, Fiction, or Bad MemoryWith iconic historical events such as the Boston Massacre it can be difficult to separate historical fact from myth. This lesson acquaints students with some of the subtleties of constructing historical accounts. It allows them to see firsthand the role of point of view, motive for writing, and historical context in doing history.

Civil War

The Multiple Dilemmas of Abraham LincolnThis lesson, an interactive historical simulation, presents students with five difficult decisions Abraham Lincoln made between his election in November 1860 and the battle of Fort Sumter in April 1861. The strength of this lesson is the wealth of primary and secondary source evidence that it uses to help students understand the challenging questions Lincoln faced.

Civil War Photos: What Do You See?This lesson provides an excellent opportunity to teach students how to analyze historical photographs. Focusing on one photograph of a piece of Civil War artillery (though making use of a variety of other images), the lesson guides students step by step in carefully analyzing various elements of the photograph.

Roads to AntietamThis lesson on the Battle of Antietam provides an excellent opportunity to both teach military history and promote historical thinking skills. Students will hone these skills as they analyze two documents written by General Lee on the eve of the Battle of Antietam. The first document, Lee’s 1862 Proclamation to the people of Maryland, sheds light on Lee’s motivations for invading Maryland. The second document, Special Orders #191, is Lee’s marching orders that were famously intercepted by the Union Army before the battle.

Causes of World War IThis video shows a 9th-grade history class applying new knowledge about causal reasoning to the question of whether two bullets were, in fact, responsible for the start of World War I.

Powers of Persuasion: Poster Art from World War IICreated for a 1994 exhibit, this site examines poster art as a method of persuasion during World War II. Featuring 33 posters and one audio clip--the song "Any Bonds Today?"--the materials are divided into two sections.

Civil Rights and IncarcerationIn this lesson students view and take notes on a 10-minute newsreel describing the evacuation and relocation of Japanese Americans from western states during World War II. Students analyze the movie using a handout.

Opening Up the Textbook: Rosa ParksThis easy-to-follow lesson cuts to the heart of historical thinking. Its strength is that it requires students to go to the sources in order to develop historical knowledge.

Progressive Movement

The Cost of IndustrializationOne of the greatest strengths of this lesson is its wealth and variety of primary sources. In addition to firsthand narrative accounts, the site also includes many photographs and political cartoons for students to analyze.